Yes, sleeping time counts towards your fasting period. While you sleep, you are not consuming any food or calories, thus maintaining your fasted state. This is a common strategy used in intermittent fasting (IF) methods to easily extend fasting windows. For example, a 12-hour fast can be achieved by finishing your evening meal before 7 pm and not eating until 7 am the next day, incorporating the sleep period within the fasting window.
Many sources confirm this:
- Medical News Today and HealthifyMe explicitly state that sleeping counts as part of the fasting period during intermittent fasting.
- DoFasting, Lasta, and Autumn Elle Nutrition all confirm that sleep is considered a fasted period because no food or calories are consumed.
- Reddit's r/intermittentfasting community similarly affirms that any time without calorie intake counts as fasted time, including sleep.
- A Quora user's question regarding the effect of sleep on the duration of a fast also received confirmation that sleep hours are included in fasting time.
This approach makes intermittent fasting more manageable, as a significant portion of the fasting window is naturally covered during sleep. It's important to remember that for this to count towards a fast, one must not consume any food or beverages with calories during this sleep period.
